Getting Help in St. Petersburg
The city of St. Petersburg is home to over 250,000 people making their way through life. This beautiful city sits on the edge of the coast with access to many stunning beaches. Yet for some the beaches, historical sights, museums, and many other spectacular forms of entertainment go to waste, drowned out by alcoholism.
St. Petersburg is by no means alone in this; in fact people all over the country have been fighting alcoholism for many years. Alcoholism has been characterized as a disease, which changed the approach that recovery services looked at and treated the condition.
One of the most important aspects of treating this disease is knowing that it has taken control of its victims. At first a person had made the choice whether or not to drink, but with excessive and regular consumption it became more than just a glass of wine with dinner. Addiction takes the priorities we have set in our life and pushes them all aside for the substance we crave, and reorganizing these priorities can be very difficult. Family, friends, even work all take a backseat to the drinking, sometimes leading to unemployment, drunk driving, or domestic violence.
Dangers Both Known and Unknown
You may not have thought about it, but drinking alcohol excessively can have some incredibly severe side-effects. Abusing this substance can lead to symptoms that can be anywhere from discomfort to death, and need to be treated properly. Short-term, the side-effects are somewhat well known: vomiting, headaches, slurred speech, shortness of breath, things that we see relatively often at the local bar. These can also be signs that someone is in need of help.
Some choose to abuse alcohol via binge drinking, a form of alcoholism commonly found in party scenarios and young adults. Binge drinking presents the highest danger for alcohol poisoning, which can be fatal and requires immediate medical attention. The signs associated with alcohol poisoning are seizures, severe confusion, irregular breathing, low body temperature, and or a suppressed gag reflex. While the last side-effect on that list may not seem like it would be so bad, it can actually be surprisingly fatal if the person passes out. If during unconsciousness a person with a suppressed gag reflex vomits there is the danger of choking, and then the vomit getting inhaled into the lungs.
The long-term effects of alcohol abuse can be even worse if the alcoholic doesn’t get help. There are health issues, both psychological and physical, that can ruin a person’s quality of life or even kill them. Physically, a long term alcoholic could be subject to an increased risk of heart attack, strokes, there is also cirrhosis and liver disease, throat and mouth cancer, and pancreatitis. Any one of which can be expensive and life-changing.
A Better Way with A Better Today
Addiction is not a crime any more than it is a choice. While we may have chosen to pick up the bottle in the first place, it is the disease that is to blame for not letting us put it down. As such, addiction should not be punished as a crime with methods like incarceration. People who are in active addiction need to be offered help, they need treatment. They need A Better Today.
A Better Today is an industry-leading recovery service offering fact-based research and techniques that have been proven to work. We don’t offer a magic cure everything pill, but we do have multiple forms of therapy, master’s educated therapists, and a caring staff that is dedicated to your recovery. ABT will also help by medically managing your withdrawal symptoms as you go through treatment.
The first step in any recovery program is the detox phase. This is the time frame where you will be unable to drink alcohol and your body will remove all of the harmful toxins and chemicals inside of your system. During this stage there may be some very unpleasant withdrawal side-effects. The fear of these side-effects sometimes drive people to continue their excessive drinking in order to avoid them, not realizing that this will only make the problem worse.
A Better Today offers medically supervised withdrawal. This is the process of using medications to offset the withdrawal symptoms. You will be given medicine to counteract the withdrawal symptoms in a slow declining manner in order to make you comfortable during this process. It is also imperative to seek medical detox when addicted to alcohol because there is a possibility of having fatal seizures.
At ABT we create individualized treatment programs designed around each client’s specific circumstances. There are many variables that can impact, positively or negatively, a client’s recovery and we strive to learn each and every one for your benefit. Variables like family history with alcohol, the severity of the client’s abuse, and even the quantity consumed to determine what approach will work best. The more we know, the better job we can do to help give you the life you deserve.
When it comes to therapy, ABT offers a handful of constructive outlets for stress in the form of therapy. The main forms that are offered are group and individual therapy. In the group setting clients will sit around one another with a therapist and share their experiences, gaining insight into one another’s lives, as well as their own. The goal is to learn more about yourself, about the different ways alcoholism can strike, and understanding the dark road you are on.
Sometimes it is difficult some people to share personal details about their lives with a group, that’s where individual therapy comes in handy. This setting is much like the group therapy, but here it is just you and the therapist. This is often paired with cognitive behavioral therapy, which is where you and the therapist will work to learn the underlying factors that led you to drinking in the first place. It could be that you turned to drinking after dealing with a hard day at work, and that just became your go to method of stress relief. It could be dealing with a substantial loss or a traumatic event. Working with your therapist will allow you to uncover these hidden reasons and then you can work together to develop necessary and productive skills to deal with them.
We also offer equine therapy, family therapy, music and art therapy, and exercise therapy. Each of these has its own strengths and benefits. The primary idea behind these therapies is to learn new ways of communication, coping skills for dealing with reality, and having a productive outlet for stress.
All of these skills will be practiced in a controlled, safe environment. We want you to be able to succeed after treatment and never relapse. Unfortunately, some people still go back at some point, and it is for this reason that ABT strongly encourages continuing your therapy after treatment is complete. There are also other ways to help keep yourself accountable while learning to handle reality, such as sober living and transitional living. These are environments that you can live in to help you stay on the sober path while you work to get back onto your feet.
How Do I Start?
The answer to this simple question is an equally simple answer: travel. ABT believes that traveling is an almost necessary step on the road to recovery because it will get you away from triggers. Not only does traveling offer the benefits of being in a new, fresh environment for this new chapter in your life, but it will also be a less stressful environment.
Triggers can be anything that causes your brain to want to drink again. Whether that thing is a favorite wine glass, seeing a bar you used to hang out in, or bumping into an old drinking buddy. Any one of these things can send you back into a relapse because it triggers the desire to drink in your mind, hence the name. These triggers are in abundance at home, but a new environment is free of these damaging familiarities, leading to a much stronger foundation for recovery.
The skills that ABT offers to teach and train you to implement can be used to fight these triggers, and live in sobriety. Once you go through ABT you are forever a part of our alumni family.
If the only thing stopping you from getting treatment for yourself or your loved ones is your pocket-book, then worry no more. ABT accepts most forms of private insurance which could cover the entire cost of your stay here. Even if it only covers a portion, or you simply don’t have insurance, ABT has also created affordable payment plans with you in mind. Nothing should get in the way of a healthy life, so call (520) 288-8484 now to get the information necessary to get started. You deserve a bright future. You deserve A Better Today.
